Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-03-07-Speech-1-103"
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"en.20050307.13.1-103"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, if one is to believe the media – and, in this instance, one might well – 2004 saw the five largest oil groups achieve net profits of EUR 65 billion, EUR 37 billion of which were attributable to the three ‘European’ groups, that is, Shell, BP and Total. If you consider the current situation and track the developments in demand, it can be assumed that this result is certain to be surpassed in 2005. Far from this being merely a short-term fluctuation in growth, the need for energy in many major countries, such as China and India, means that these profits will increase still further.
Some of these increases in profit amount, in 2004 alone, to 20, 30, 40, or 50% over against 2003. What are the companies doing with these great profits? It is interesting to have a look at their balance sheets on the Internet; most of these profits go to the shareholders, and a substantial chunk of them is used to buy back shares; Shell, for example, in the fourth quarter of 2004 alone, spent EUR 1.6 billion on doing that and is planning to spend between EUR 2.3 billion and EUR 3.9 billion in 2005. BP did likewise, and is indeed setting aside even more for next year – EUR 6 billion for share withdrawal, for stabilisation, for the avoidance of excessive influence on the part of its shareholders, and so on.
On the other hand, though, we have a situation – one about which you, Commissioner, have had a lot of positive things to say – in which the European Union is endeavouring to develop sustainable energy systems and to spend money on research. Unless I am wrong, EUR 900 million have been set aside for Community research in these various areas between 2003 and 2006. The fact is that that is a fraction of what the big oil companies – I am not talking about the medium-sized or small ones – operating in Europe and elsewhere, have earned. It is a fraction of what the big oil companies use to buy up their own shares and make themselves rather less liable to the influence of their own shareholders.
There is a great discrepancy here. I do not begrudge anyone their profits, but we know perfectly well that what the oil firms are receiving are mainly windfall profits, resulting not from their own investments or efforts, but from the state of the market, that is to say, from increases in supply and demand. I therefore think it really is time that these profits also yielded up something for the development and application of alternative, renewable energies, in other words for sustainable energy systems in general.
In the ordinary way of things, we would do that with taxes, but that is not possible. The industry itself has always expressed great interest in voluntary agreements, and would like to make a public show of its sense of responsibility. What, for the international oil companies, could be better than to show their responsibility by being willing to do as the Commission wishes – which I hope it does – and discuss this with it, in order that we may together come to a voluntary agreement to use at least some of these windfall profits for research into, and development of, sustainable energy systems. With this in mind, I would ask the Commission – and you too, Commissioner – to give this proposal some serious thought and to talk to the big groups in the hope of getting something for this purpose. This would enable us to apply funds to other important research tasks. The oil companies would be well advised to show themselves to be socially responsible and to develop alternative energy systems."@en1
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